Yes -- keeping older posts searchable is more important than sticking with GPL-only products

53%

[ 84 ]

No -- lose some of the older posts and stay on the GPL'd phpBB

46%

[ 73 ]

Total Votes : 157

Author

Message

JeedoApprentice

Joined: 02 May 2003Posts: 202Location: Akureyri, Iceland

Posted: Tue Sep 30, 2003 8:53 am Post subject:

Esben wrote:

On a side note, I have sometimes wondered if it would be possible to delete old, unanswered questions, or perhaps threads with no views in a long time.

I agree with the first suggestion deleting old questions, but certanly not deleting just unanswered threads, a good example of a useful thread that goes unanswered is this one https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=89382 - something i posted which would come in handy for anyone setting up gentoo on a Rev B. iMac, something rare, but exactly what is good about these forums, stuff like this is archived here.

A good idea that someone had here is deleteing all the stuff in off the wall, but that will only buy us time not solve the problem.

Hello. I have not voted as yet as I'd like your view on a certain portion of the gentoo linux social contract.

Code:

However, Gentoo Linux will never depend upon a piece of software unless it conforms to the GNU General Public License, GNU Lesser General Public License or some other license approved by the Open Source Initiative (OSI.) Note: We are considering extending the above clause to require that all core Gentoo Linux components must conform to a license approved by the OSI and Free Software Foundation (FSF.)

So, I think that there's just one view.
If the forum, and the software used to support it, can be considered as a component of Gentoo GNU/Linux project (and it *should*, IMO), the answer would be:

No -- lose some of the older posts and stay on the GPL'd phpBB

or just look for another GPL'd software that has a better performance with the DB, or let's improve the current one.
The point is: if you're going to use a non GPL'd software, IMHO you're not following the terms of the above "gentoo linux social contract".

I think we should stick with GPL software. I think the best solution would be to back-up old posts and remove them from the active forum for the moment, then bring them back when a new version of phpbb can handle them again.

So, what could be deleted or archived?

- Off the Wall posts that hasn't been replied to in 3 months.
- Gentoo Chat that hasn't been replied to in 3 months.
- Duplicate Threads older than 3 months.
- Unanswered posts older than 3 months (with the exception of Tips & Tricks)

Of course, the pruning should stop one a version of phpbb or other Free forum software that can handle the loads becomes available.

What if you were to move the forums to a USENET news server? It should be able to handle the load and if you connect it to the rest of the world Google (and the other search engines (are there others?)) would automatically index it for searches. Others who are non-gentoo people might see answers to general questions where they otherwise wouldn't.

Just my idea._________________Life is too short and too important to { take seriously | use Windows }.

we went the other way and downgraded to 2.3.20 and that seems to have cleared up that specific problem. From talking to the gentoo dev that maintains that ebuild in portage, he mentioned that 2.3.21+ have had some stability problems and he recommends sticking with .20 for now.

--kurt_________________The problem with political jokes is that they get elected

My settings are set such that it'll automagically purge old unaccessed files once the cache has filled up, since a full cache appears to be what's causing the error when trying to use the phpBB ACP. YMMV._________________phpBBProject Manager | Best blog in the World after Fafblog

Upgrading to the latest version of phpBB, 2.0.6 -- we have a Gentoo dev working on patching the files.

And seeing how this works. If it solves the performance problems, at least long enough to see how 2.2 performs, then great. If not, I believe the majority of the respondents so far have indicated that ensuring we do not lose posts is more important than sticking with a GPL'd program. Thus, we will look at alternate solutions that allow us to scale better.

Also, we would very much like to find a way to easily stay on phpBB2. That means less work for us and less hassle for our users. I appreciate the suggestions that you all have offered. Some of them require too much integration and/or development work to make them feasible, either from an implementation standpoint or from a standpoint of maintaining a hacked-up custom code base on an ongoing basis. Others have been very helpful and will hopefully allow us to continue using phpBB for some time to come.

--kurt_________________The problem with political jokes is that they get elected

It is clear that the forums (and the ability to search) are vital to the Gentoo project. I guess you could say that Gentoo depends on them. Therefore the social contract would apply.

However which is worse, violating the social contract and having a critical piece of Gentoo work, or keeping to the contract and making Gentoo dysfunctional?

Clearly niether is ideal! However, we must do something. This is my solution. As a TEMPORARY measure switch over to a propriatary solution. Then, work hand in hand with the phpBB developers to get that software to acceptable performance then switch back. I think that this solution would best keep with the spirit (if not the letter) of the social contract. At any rate It is the most pragmatic one. Ask yourself, WWLD? (What would Linus do?)

Either way I trust our admins and moderators to come up with an aimiable solution. There is a lot of talent arround these parts and I am sure that we will solve this issue. I only wish there was some way I could help!

Hey Kurt, maybe you addressed this already, but is there a deadline for when this decision will be made? I noticed you mentioned Friday in one post, but I was wondering if that was a real deadline or you were just making a point.

-nbrown

PS I vote we switch to a proprietary system if we need to. Keeping the posts is incredibly important to a distribution like this. If the tweaks can hold back the flood for a bit though, then I say we should look into other alternatives (omega, helping phpbb, etc).

My vote would be - IF the updates + fixes + mmcache etc. don't work as expected, rather try to go with InvisionBoard...

although I do hope, the proposed patches will work out _________________"The future masters of technology will have to be lighthearted and intelligent. The machine easily masters the grim and the dumb."
Marshall McLuhan, 1969